Yemeni tribesmen bomb pipeline

24 March 2014, News Wires – Yemeni tribesmen bombed Yemen’s main crude export pipeline over the weekend, forcing oil flows to be stopped, according to reports.

“The pipeline was attacked by tribesmen. The damage is quite big and oil flow as stopped,” Reuters quoted an industry source, who declined to be identified, as saying.

The demands of the tribesmen were not known, but in the past they have wanted relatives to be released from prisons or to protest against their unemployment.

Yemen’s oil and gas pipelines have repeatedly been sabotaged by insurgents or angry tribesmen since anti-government protests created a power vacuum in 2011, causing fuel shortages and slashing export earnings for the impoverished country.

Its main export pipeline carries about 70,000-110,000 barrels per day of Marib light crude an export terminal on the Red Sea.

A long closure in 2011 forced Yemen’s largest refinery at Aden to shut, leaving the small producer dependent on fuel donations from Saudi Arabia and imports.

Yemen’s stability is a priority for the US and its Gulf Arab allies because of its strategic position next to top oil exporter Saudi Arabia and shipping lanes, and because it is home to one of the most active wings of al Qaeda.